6 October 1997

Property

Denton Hall advised the Equitable Life Assurance Society on selling a 15-year lease on 238,000sqft of its speculative Hemel distribution centre to Gillette UK. Gillette was advised by Simmons & Simmons. Leeds firm McGuinness Finch advised Gazeley Properties on providing £26m funding to Equitable for the scheme.

Middle East meeting

Lawyers from Israeli and Palestinian firms will be among the delegates at a business law conference in Jerusalem later this month on doing business in the Middle East. The conference, which runs from 18 to 22 June, has been organised by the International Association of Young Lawyers. Organiser Clare Grayston, head of corporate finance at […]

Bar-wide elections proposed

PLANS to open up the election of the Bar Council chair to all barristers and provide a minimum salary for pupils and young tenants are among a raft of motions before this Saturday’s Bar Council AGM. The Bar Council leadership has indicated it will oppose the call for Bar-wide elections for the chair and other […]

Far East countries head salary league

Lawyers are twice as well paid in Singapore, Hong Kong and Japan as they are in the UK, according to a survey released by the consulting arm of legal headhunter Longbridge International. According to the 1997 Salary Research for Lawyers report, compiled from Longbridge’s own database of placements, a two-year-qualified solicitor at a leading UK […]

Recession bites…

“Too often lawyers operate as a herd, running in a state of panic from one fashionable priority to another,” is how one editorial started in January 1991, but this was not a blanket criticism – a number of moves were praised. For example, in a move looking forward to the European market opening in 1992, […]

Counting on MDPs

The new Government has surprised its critics as much as its supporters with the energy with which it has struck out on a programme of broad reform. Liberalising the legal profession may not be an issue that leaps into newspaper headlines, but if the Government attacks it with the verve it has shown in other […]

Onwards, upwards…

In 10 years’ time lawyers are likely to have a raft of new legislation to work with, including a Bill of Rights and a Freedom of Information Act. But what other changes will have taken place? Will barristers still be wearing wigs? Perhaps the courts will be overrun by solicitor advocates, or maybe cases will […]

Minimum salary stays despite opposition

The mandatory minimum salary for trainee solicitors – £10,850 or £12,150 in central London – is to be maintained despite the objections of 70 per cent of the respondents to a consultation paper sent out to the profession. The Law Society council voted by a large majority last Thursday to maintain the minimum salary and […]

Guarding against fraudsters

Lawyers are often asked to advise people who are forming a charity. Once the charity is registered, they become its trustees and, because they have advised on the charity’s legal responsibilities, they are often asked to explain how to prevent fraud. So what advice should they give? The first point to make is that the […]

Directorships elude heads of in-house legal departments

Not enough in-house legal heads have seats on the boards of the companies they represent, despite the large budgets they control, according to a survey conducted by Eversheds. The report, Law in Business, based on a poll of 104 heads of in-house legal departments, questions whether career expectations of lawyers are being met by industry. […]

Girling fights for rights of UK lawyers Stateside

The President of the Law Society, Tony Girling, will attempt to end a long-running dispute over requalification rights for English lawyers in New York, when he visits the US city to attend the International Bar Association’s 50th anniversary celebrations. Girling intends to take advantage of the visit this week to open a “direct line of […]

Penningtons lawyer rejects partnership to set up firm

Costas Andrea, a senior Penningtons lawyer, has left the firm to set up his own niche practice, passing up a partnership offer in the process. He takes another assistant, a secretary and “300 cases” with him to form the firm Andrea & Co, which is based in Old Woking in Surrey. Andrea had been with […]